Without remorse or humility until the end, killer John Battaglia, who murdered his two young daughters in his Texas home in 2001, laughed and taunted his ex-wife as he was executed Thursday.
Battaglia saved his last words for his ex-wife Mary Jean Pearle, the Dallas Morning News reported. “Well, hi, Mary Jean. I’ll see y’all later. Bye,” he said to Pearle, who had come to watch him die.
As he drew his last breaths, 17 years after Battaglia had killed her two children, Pearle was heard to say “I’ve seen enough of him” as she walked away from his motionless body, separated by a glass window. Battaglia's demeanor was described as "jovial" as he prepared to meet his end by lethal injection at Texas’s Huntsville Unit.
Strapped to the gurney, Battaglia looked around as witnesses entered. “How many people are there? Oh, that’s a lot,” he said.
Shortly after being administered with the injection, the 62-year-old continued to speak. Looking to the chaplain standing at his feet Battaglia asked: “Am I still alive?” He smiled and grinned before finally saying “Oh, here, I feel it.”
Battaglia was the third man executed in Texas since the start of 2018 and the second killer from Dallas put to death since the start of the week.
In May 2001 he shot his 6 and 9-year-old daughters Liberty and Faith in his Deep Ellum home while his wife listened to the ordeal over the phone.
Battaglia forced Faith to confront her mother in the call, moments before he took her life. “Mommy, why do you want Daddy to have to got to jail?” she asked before she was heard begging for her life. “No, Daddy. Don’t do it,” she said.
The execution concludes a series of court battles over Battaglia’s mental competency. The courts twice granted a stay of execution so that he could be evaluated. Final efforts by his attorneys to delay the execution were ultimately unsuccessful.
According to the Guardian there had been fears Battaglia’s execution would be botched amid a spate alarming scenes in Texas executions. The use of old and poorly regulated sedatives, also used in this most recent execution, amounted to almost unsuccessful procedures in the case of Anthony Shore on January 18 and William Rayford on January 30.
In Battaglia’s case it took 22 minutes for the inmate to be pronounced dead following the lethal injection.
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